The US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency brought the case against O'Dwyer and TVShack.net after claiming that the site earned more than $230,000 (£147,000) in advertising revenue by offering copyrighted material.

The domain name was seized by US authorities in June 2010, and then shut down.

After O'Dwyer's extradition order was agreed by the Home Secretary in May, Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales hit out at the decision, saying that it was the US trying to "prosecute a UK citizen for an alleged crime which took place on UK soil".

Human rights campaign group Liberty has welcomed O'Dwyer's proposed "deferred prosecution" deal, but said that it shows extradition laws are in need of urgent reform.

"This will be a huge relief for Richard, but how appalling that he had to wait so long for the US authorities to make this decision," said Isabella Sankey, Liberty's director of policy.

"Case after case shows that our extradition arrangements must be overhauled to allow people who have never left these shores to be dealt with here at home."